Even a Grade School Is No Refuge From Gunfire

By DON TERRY,

Published: October 17, 1992

CHICAGO, Oct. 16—
The youngest pupils at Jenner Elementary School have not learned how to spell "violence" yet, but they know what it means. They have already seen a lot of it, sometimes just beyond their classroom windows.

Since March, three Jenner pupils have been shot to death within blocks of the sturdy red brick building on the shabby grounds of the vast Cabrini-Green public housing development, not far from the glitter and wealth of Chicago's Near North Side.

At Jenner, going to funerals and counting bullet holes in the walls is a part of life for many children. 7-Year-Old Cut Down

On Tuesday, 7-year-old Dantrell Davis, was cut down as he walked to the school just across the street from his home in the development.

The boy was apparently a casualty of the gang wars that rage in some neighborhoods here like forest fires. A 33-year-old man, who the police said was a gang member aiming at a knot of teen-age rivals, was arrested in the case.

The slaying has shaken the city. It has been front-page news all week. The head of Chicago's public housing authority says he wants the National Guard to be called in to sweep the 7,000-resident development of gangs and guns. The building where the gunman hid has been closed, and its few remaining tenants are being sent elsewhere until its security can be assured. With three-quarters of its apartments vacant, it had become a haven of street gangs.

Jeanette Walker, who has two sons at Jenner, asked a question the other day that is echoing through the city, "How can you protect your kids when anywhere that you go can be the wrong place at the wrong time?"

In the inner city, places like Jenner must be both school and sanctuary. In the words of one teacher, "We try to give the students a taste of childhood."

But the bullet that ripped into Dantrell's head also wounded the spirit of the school and the struggling apartment buildings that surround it.

"There have always been shootings before school and after school," said Juris Strautmanis, a guidance counselor at Jenner. "But this happened right at school. It just became more real, more unbearable to everyone. Usually at times like this we just have to deal with the students and the parents. Now we have to deal with the teachers, too. It's just been too much." 'In Complete Disarray'

At the moment Dantrell was killed, the sidewalk in front of the school was crowded with students and teachers. The hallways were decorated with paper Halloween ghosts and vampires, the corridors echoing with the start of a new day.

Now the ghosts seem real.

One teacher said he might not teach again. Another said he was "in complete disarray," struggling to "keep hope alive in myself and my students." A social worker begged a little girl not to cry "because if you do, I know I will." And in the principal's office, along with fliers about parties and spelling bees, was a copy of Dantrell's funeral announcement.

For the last couple of years, in addition to the traditional fire drills, Jenner has had a shooting drill. When the gunfire from the project across the street gets too heavy, the public address system at Jenner crackles to life, telling the teachers to hustle their students into the hallways until the all-clear is sounded.

Mr. Strautmanis said, "People say our kids are used to the shooting, that they're somehow immune to the violence because it's so common."

"That's crazy," he sighed, the look of weary sadness in his eyes. "The kids never get used to it. Every time shots are fired or somebody gets shot, it just adds to the trauma. And shots are fired every day."

The younger children at Jenner talk of nightmares and being afraid to sleep alone. The older students, the seventh graders taught by Darrell Pickett, for example, speak of revenge. But their tough words do a poor job of hiding their hurt. So Mr. Pickett, who saw Dantrell get shot, had his students write essays about what happened.

"I'm sick of this," wrote Runauda McQueen, 12. "Now we are at war."

In an interview, Runauda said he went home and cried the day Dantrell died. "And I looked in the mirror because I wanted to see how much I'm blessed," he said. "I said to myself, 'I can't let this happen to me. I can't let this happen to my family.' Right now, I want to go to the Army and bring back some guns."

A classmate, Deon Crosby, 11, said he wanted to become a lawyer. "I can't go to school without rolling under cars and dodging bullets," he wrote. "I'm scared because it could be any of us. I don't care about no Christmas presents. I thank God for waking up."

In Angela Bynum's second-grade classroom, Cassanova Hastings, 7, is the mathematics champion. In the last few days, he has not had a lot of time to concentrate on his homework. He saw Dantrell get shot. And when he talks about it, Cassanova clutches his side where he said he was shot three years ago as he played in front of his Cabrini-Green apartment building.

"I got shot right here," he said, pointing to a spot just below his rib cage. "And the ambulance came in one minute. I'm so glad they came in one minute because I'm alive."

LaShaun Crosby and Stormy Ervin, both 8 years old, and Darren Pearson, 7, blurted out a jumble of wishes and hopes.

"No violence," said LaShaun.

"No killing," added Darren.

"No drugs," said Stormy.

Darren said his mother would not allow him to play outside now. Then he mumbled something about being scared.

When asked what he had said, Stormy interrupted and answered for him, "He said, he's scared because he doesn't want to die." 'Doesn't Anybody Care?'

Standing nearby, Mrs. Bynum, a teacher at Jenner since 1974, watched her students work. She said the children's strength was teaching the teachers. "We're falling apart and they're going through this on a regular basis, yet they keep on achieving," she said. "I think they're wonderful. And it's enraging that people write these children off just because of where they live. Are these forgotten children? Doesn't anybody care?"

The other pupils from Jenner who have been slain in the last eight months were Anthony Felton, 8, and Laquanda Edwards, a 15-year-old girl who had recently graduated. They were killed in the summertime or on a weekend. Because of that, their deaths seemed slightly less immediate, even though they, too, died within blocks of Jenner and even though their deaths haunted the school and still do.

There are 601 public schools in Chicago and several of them, like Jenner, are near housing projects.

"We've lost students to gunfire everywhere, not just near public housing projects," said Laurie M. Sanders, a Board of Education spokeswoman.

Since Dantrell was killed, Arwilda Burton, a social worker, has been going from room to room talking to the children about their feelings and fears.

Grief is no stranger at Jenner. Last year, Ms. Burton held regular "grieving" sessions with a group of first- and second-graders who had lost family members and friends to the murder and mayhem that surrounds them.

On Thursday, two days after the shooting, Ms. Burton gathered five girls, ranging in age from 7 to 9, together around a yellow table to talk about Dantrell's death.

"Ms. Burton, I'm glad the police caught that man who shot Danny," said Darrah Walker, 9. "Now, he'll be in jail and won't be able to murder people."

"He's going to get out," said Querita Davis, 8. "Everybody gets out of jail."

Ms. Burton wiped a tear from her eye and checked her schedule for the next day. There were at least a dozen more students she needed to talk to about the death of Dantrell Davis.

There was his funeral to go to.

"I just want to hug them all and make the hurt go away," she said. "But my arms just aren't long enough."

Photo: Since March, three students have been shot to death within blocks of Jenner Elementary School, near the Cabrini-Green housing project in Chicago. Younger pupils like Stormy Ervin, left, LaShaun Crosby, center, and Darren Pearson, say they are afraid of the violence and of dying. (Cynthia Howe for The New York Times)